This year Presqu’ile saw another record-breaking season with over 400,000 visitors from April 1st to September 30th alone!
This fall park staff have been continuing to remove dangerous ash trees from the campgrounds and many areas will look dramatically different come the spring. On a more positive note, over 500 trees are being planted this November to help jumpstart reforestation in the campgrounds. Look for these new trees in Elmvale and Trail’s End campgrounds.
We have also been sourcing some new Presqu’ile-themed merchandise including new patches, pins, ornaments and clothing. All these new items are available at the Main Lobby store which is open Tuesday to Thursday for November and December. Drop by to check out what’s new and get your Christmas shopping done early.
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This November we also celebrated Karen’s retirement after 17 years at Presqu’ile. Karen was a mainstay of our maintenance and cleaning teams, mentoring many students over her 17 years here at the park. We wish Karen all the best on her retirement, and we know that the maintenance team won’t be the same without her!
Discovery Update
This summer has also been a record year for our Discovery team! They delivered 159 programs to over 10,800 visitors between Canada Day and Labour Day which is the highest attendance in the past 5 years! Over the course of the summer, over 10 000 visitors explored the Nature Centre learning about fossils, monarchs, turtles and more! At the Lighthouse Interpretive Centre over 17,000 people uncovered some of the history of Presqu’ile.
Along with regular Discovery programming there was also three special event weekends, two special event days and three concerts hosted this summer. From birdwatching to picnic games and everything in between, there was something for visitors of all ages this summer. Thank you to everyone who attended one of our programs and events and if you haven’t had a chance to join us, consider attending one of our guided hikes this winter.
We have had another successful year with school programs, with 61 programs delivered to over 1,500 students. Janet is working to expand the diversity of school programs we offer, and we are excited to have a Giant Floor Map from Canada Geographic that we hope to take to schools this winter to offer some in-school programming. This giant map of Ontario highlights all the provincial parks in Ontario as well as other protected areas, First Nations reserves and more. If you know a teacher who might be interested in booking a school program at Presqu’ile, they can reach out to Janet at janet.fenton@ontario.ca
Volunteers are a large part of Presqu’ile, and the park staff would like to acknowledge that we are very grateful for all the support. Volunteers help to make this park great, and we could not do many of the things that we do today without volunteers and their support.
